First Foundation Inc. (FFWM) to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.01 on May 16th

First Foundation Inc. (NASDAQ:FFWM) declared a quarterly dividend on Friday, April 26th, Wall Street Journal reports. Investors of record on Monday, May 6th will be paid a dividend of 0.01 per share by the bank on Thursday, May 16th. This represents a $0.04 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.66%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, May 3rd.

First Foundation has a dividend payout ratio of 3.8% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect First Foundation to earn $1.03 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.04 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 3.9%.

First Foundation Trading Down 9.3 %

FFWM opened at $6.08 on Friday. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $7.34 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $7.49. The firm has a market capitalization of $343.58 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.00 and a beta of 1.23. First Foundation has a fifty-two week low of $3.69 and a fifty-two week high of $11.47. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.52, a current ratio of 1.05 and a quick ratio of 1.05.

First Foundation (NASDAQ:FFWM) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 25th. The bank reported $0.05 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.02 by $0.03. The company had revenue of $56.37 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $62.03 million. First Foundation had a negative net margin of 32.44% and a positive return on equity of 1.11%. As a group, research analysts predict that First Foundation will post 0.27 earnings per share for the current year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages have commented on FFWM. StockNews.com raised First Foundation from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday. Wedbush cut their price objective on First Foundation from $8.00 to $7.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday. Finally, Raymond James upgraded First Foundation from an “outperform” rating to a “strong-buy” rating and upped their target price for the company from $9.50 to $12.00 in a report on Friday, January 5th.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other First Foundation news, Chairman Ulrich E. Keller, Jr. sold 25,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 29th. The shares were sold at an average price of $8.16, for a total transaction of $204,000.00. Following the sale, the chairman now owns 1,230,622 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $10,041,875.52. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. 10.20% of the stock is owned by insiders.

About First Foundation

First Foundation Inc, through its subsidiaries, provides banking services, investment advisory, wealth management, and trust services to individuals, businesses, and other organizations in the United States. The company operates in two segments, Banking and Wealth Management. It offers a range of deposit products, including personal and business checking accounts, savings accounts, interest-bearing demand deposit accounts, money market accounts, and time certificate of deposits; and loan products consisting of multifamily and single family residential real estate loans, commercial real estate loans, commercial term loans, and line of credits, as well as consumer loans, such as personal installment loans and line of credits, and home equity line of credits.